


Homecoming

by Talithax



Category: Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol (2011), Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation (2015)
Genre: Established Relationship, M/M, POV First Person
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-11
Updated: 2015-10-11
Packaged: 2018-04-25 21:06:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,372
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4976542
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Talithax/pseuds/Talithax
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Now that his self-imposed mission of stopping The Syndicate has finally come to a successful end, what's Ethan going to find when he re-joins the others in London?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Homecoming

**Author's Note:**

> ~ Narrated by Ethan & Self-Beta'd.
> 
> So...
> 
> ... It's like this. I've just had a week off work. A week in which I'd had plans to... beta, and write, and catch up on (long overdue) emails, and stop dithering over this mental block on posting, and...
> 
> Yeah.
> 
> Needless to say it didn't exactly work out. I... wrote a few notes on Friday, and I'm... forcing... myself to post this now so I can at least try to kid myself that the entire week hasn't been a complete (oh the irony) write off, and...
> 
> Epic Fail, really.
> 
> Oh well. This was written pretty much straight after seeing Rogue Nation, so... I've only been sitting on it for 2 months, which, hey, is nothing compared to others I've got lying around. (So... Yay?)
> 
> As always, I offer my thanks to everyone who has ever taken them time to write a comment or leave kudos on any of my fics, and... truly hope you enjoy this one!

===========  
Homecoming  
by TalithaX  
===========

Unbuckling my seatbelt, I open the door and hesitate over whether I should grunt a bland 'thanks for the lift' at the driver or not. Common old manners, the ones drilled in to me by my mother decades ago, tells me that I should, that, even if I don't mean it – or, for that matter, actually care one iota if the man lives or dies – it's just the done thing to do. 

You know... Play the game. Play at being normal. Play at being just another member of society going about his business. 

I mean, I could say it. Of course I could. I could, without too much effort, even manage to make it sound like I actually meant it.

“Thanks for the lift...”

… “You humourless, dead-from-the-knees-up, smug, stuck-up asshole.”

It's not as though I asked for a driver. In fact, given that I've always felt driving anywhere in London is usually little more than an exercise in both patience and masochism, I could have quite happily walked from Thames House to our accommodation in Tower Hamlets in about the same time it's taken Mr Stuck-Up-And-Grumpy to drive here. Forty minutes. For forty very long, and very tedious minutes I've been stuck in the back seat of a nondescript black Jaguar while my driver, a wannabe Bond who is never going to make it with the big boys out in the field because he lacks the innate acting ability to disguise his emotions, glowered at me in the rear-vision mirror and, in general, just gave every indication of being completely put out by my mere existence. We've never met before. Hell. I don't even know his name. Yet he, for some reason, certainly seems to feel as though he both knows and, while I'm at it, very much dislikes me. 

Too exhausted, however, to be bothered by what some MI6 goon that I hope never to see again happens to think of me, I don't care if he's gullible enough to believe every rumour he's ever heard uttered about me and nor, for that matter, do I actually give a flying fuck what he thinks of either me or the IMF. Rogue. Dangerous. Arrogant. Careless. Reckless. 

Just...

… Whatever.

I honestly don't care.

I do what it is I feel I have to do, and that, really, is just all there is to it. I don't do it for either praise or recognition, and I certainly don't do it in the egotistical hope of getting to show other agencies up. I just do it because, when it boils down to it, someone has to. And if happens to ruffle a few high ranking feathers along the way then, seriously, that's just too fucking bad. MI6 or the CIA don't have to like my way of doing things. While I'm at it, the IMF don't have to love it either. No. They just have to, so long as the results continue to be the right ones, accept it with both an open mind and one eye on my track record. I don't ask for blind loyalty, and I'll always be the first one to acknowledge my mistakes, but what I do ask for, what I like to think I've earned, is trust. Trust in my instincts and abilities, and one hundred percent unwavering trust in my loyalties. 

Again though, whatever.

What's done is done.

Biting back a sigh, I settle for begrudgingly nodding at the driver in a way that he can choose to read as thanks if he wants to and climb out of the car. Clearly as pleased to see the back of me as I am of him, he has his foot on the accelerator even before I've taken my hand off the door and I watch the Jag tear off up the street for a few seconds before shrugging and turning my attention to getting my bearings. Never having been to the MI6 safe-house that they've oh-so-magnanimously given us the use of while we're still in London, I'm not entirely sure as to just what door it is I need to knock on and for an awful second start to feel a sense of paranoia beginning to creep over me. 

What if, pissed off at having their short comings spectacularly brought home to them by a bunch of Yanks, Six have planned a bit of a... party... for me? I'm unarmed, tired, and not familiar with the area. I also, despite all the inter-agency ass kissing and sanctimonious gratitude that's been going on these past two days, know that as far as Her Majesty's Secret Service go I'm still persona non grata and that, if they thought they could get away with it, they'd like nothing more than to try to bring me down a peg or two. 

It's not an overly pleasant thought, and God knows I'm not in the mood for a fight, but it's still one of those things that I'd be foolish not to consider as a definite possibility. Nobody likes having their dirty laundry so spectacularly aired in public, and while it hardly achieves anything other than a fleeting sense of satisfaction, wanting a form of payback can just be put down to human nature. In other words, it's just... one of those things. I've never been involved in it, or even felt much of an urge for it myself, but that doesn't mean I haven't heard, in some cases in quite graphic, self-congratulatory detail, all about it or been witness to the aftermath. You'd be forgiven for thinking, given that the end of the day we all work towards achieving the same goal of world security, that agencies like the IMF, CIA, MI6 et al would be all on the same page and be like one big, international family. Sadly, however, nothing could be further from the truth and despite the high stakes involved we generally just view each other with suspicion, paranoia and outright dislike.

It's pathetic, and it never ceases to bug the crap out of me, but, again, it really is just one of those things and I'm not even sure there's much hope of it ever changing.

Immediately more alert than I'd been during the seemingly never ending drive, I straighten my shoulders and glance around the dimly lit street. While one side is lined with small, drab in their uniformity, terrace houses that all have a car parallel parked on the street out the front, the other is taken up by a massive, overgrown hedge that, if my knowledge of London's geography serves me correctly, acts as a fence around an old cemetery. Thanks to the street lights being quite a distance apart, the street is covered in both shadows and prime places to launch an ambush from and, feeling edgier by the second, I'm about to just call it quits and set off on my own when the front door of a house a couple of metres to my right opens to display the reassuringly familiar figure of Luther. 

Far more relieved at the sight of him than I want to let on, I shrug and casually amble towards the house.

“So they let you go, then,” Luther drawls, leaning his none-too-considerable bulk against the door frame as he watches me approach.

“It was touch and go there for a while,” I retort, grinning at him as I come to a stop on the doorstep, “but I knew I could always count on you coming to my rescue if they'd decided to lock me up and throw away the key.”

“Break in to Thames House?” Clearly appalled by the very thought, Luther pulls a face and shakes his head. “Hell, no. Have you any idea the sort of security they'd be running at a place like that?” Pausing, he shrugs and claps his hand down on my shoulder. “Besides, it'd be crawling with those bastard Spooks, and I hate Spooks.”

“And yet you'd still have come for me,” I reply, stepping into the house and, as Luther steps back to let me in, giving him a rough hug. “Spooks or no Spooks, you'd have found a way in and rescued my ass.”

“Don't I always?” Luther mutters, returning the hug for a few seconds before releasing me and slowly looking me up and down. “So... We good?”

I nod. “We're good,” I confirm, taking my suit jacket off and hanging it on the rack by the door. “Well, that is Six and Hunley have reluctantly made their peace with us all being on the same side and, as I suspect you already know, a joint task force is being formed to hunt down what's left of the Syndicate.”

“You in?” Luther queries in his typically blunt and to the point manner as he gestures for me to follow him along the thin, unfurnished and decidedly beige looking corridor.

“Believe it or not, they actually asked me to head it,” I reply, giving him a wry look as we walk into a small, sparsely furnished room that I think, going on the lumpy looking sofa that gives every indication of being as uncomfortable as it does dated, mismatching armchairs and rickety looking coffee-table, is meant to be a living room.

“You're kidding me, right?” Luther mutters as, slowly shaking his head, he makes his way across the room and sinks down onto the sofa. “Bet Hunley looked like he was going to choke.”

“He wasn't the only one,” I respond, perching on the arm of the closest armchair and looking across at Luther as he struggles to make himself comfortable. “I don't know if you had the misfortune of encountering Atlee's replacement, Scott Chesterfield, but I honestly thought he was in danger of popping a blood vessel as, through gritted teeth, he confirmed that the offer came with full MI6 backing.”

“Sounds like a fun meeting.”

“Oh yeah, it was a blast.”

“Fun times, huh?”

“Definitely another highlight, that's for sure.”

“And?” Folding his arms across his chest, Luther gives me an expectant look.

“I told them to stick it, of course,” I state flatly. “The remnants of the Syndicate are their problem now, not mine.”

“Just like that, huh,” he murmurs, his expression giving nothing away as he continues to gaze at me. “You give six months of your life to hunting the Syndicate and now, now that you've been vindicated, you want nothing more to do with them?”

“We've given them Lane on a plate,” I respond with a shrug, “and, feeling as though I've done my bit, I now want to come in. Having spent the last eighteen hours being interrogated and being made to feel as though it's still somehow all my fault, they're now as up to speed on the Syndicate as I am and...” Trailing off, I look Luther in the eye. “I'm done.”

“Sounds good to me,” Luther replies matter-of-factly as, flashing me a brief smile of understanding, he stretches his arms along the back of the sofa. “So, now what?”

“Ask me again in the morning,” I murmur, glancing pointedly towards the door before turning my attention back to Luther and stifling a yawn.

“Tired?”

“Exhausted.”

“Then go to bed. We can talk more after you've had some, much needed, if the look of you is anything to go by, shut-eye.”

“Mmm...” Standing up, I take a couple of steps towards the door before stopping and, in the name of being completely honest with myself here, issuing forth with the question I've been wanting the answer to ever since Luther opened the door. “Oh, hey... Before I turn in, where's everyone else?”

“Having finally managed to track Jane down, Benji's on the phone somewhere chewing her ear off, and Brandt...”

“Will,” I correct, both automatically and without even stopping to think about it. “His name's Will.”

“He answers to Brandt,” Luther counters, giving me a knowing look from beneath an arched brow.

“He'll probably answer to... 'hey, you'... as well, but that's beside the point,” I retort. “His name's Will.”

“So?”

“Does he call you Stickell?”

“No, but...”

“But, nothing. Call him...”

“If he doesn't like what I call him then he can say something himself.”

“He mightn't care, but I do!” I exclaim, folding my arms across my chest and, for no other reason than I'm just too tired to back down, glaring at Luther through narrowed eyes. It doesn't matter a damn, and Luther's perfectly right in that, if he had a problem with being called by his surname, Will could speak up himself, but I can't help it. “Just... Call him Will, yeah...”

His expression saying 'whatever' more succinctly than simply stating the word ever could, Luther shrugs and, leaning forward, glances up towards the ceiling. “Sick of pretending he wasn't slowly going out of his mind waiting for you, William,” he replies, making a deliberate point of drawing his name out, “went up to bed an hour or so ago.”

“Oh.” Softening my stance, I drop my arms to my side and, avoiding Luther's gaze, shrug. “You think he was waiting for me?” I murmur in as neutral a tone as I can manage. “Maybe he was...”

“He was waiting for you,” Luther interrupts with just the slightest hint of exasperation creeping in to his voice. “And, before you feel compelled to ask, the reason I happen to know this is because A) he'd look out the window every time he thought he heard a car pull up, and B) when he wasn't pacing around whining about hating not knowing what was going on, he was on the phone harassing everyone he could think of in search of news. So... Have you got it yet? He was waiting for you.”

“Oh,” I repeat as, too pleased by this – truth be told, quite unexpectedly glorious – snippet of news to care what Luther might decide to read in to it, I smile what may well be the first genuinely happy smile for six months. “In that case I suppose I'd better go let him know that I'm back.”

“You do that.” Standing up, Luther walks over and positions himself directly in front of me. “I suspect I'm not telling you anything you don't already know,” he states, placing his hand on my shoulder and giving me a smug, knowing smile, “but dude's got your back. In fact...” Closing his hand around my shoulder, he waits until our eyes meet before adding, “Just call me psychic, but I get the feeling he's got... more... than just your back.”

“You're singing a new tune, aren't you?” I murmur as, not really wanting to be having this conversation right now, I shrug free of Luther's hand and take a step back. “I mean, what happened to viewing him with nothing other than great suspicion and, in quite a few cases, great derision?”

“That was before he didn't think twice about calling me in once the kill order was out,” he replies. “That, and just having actually worked with him these past few days and seeing that, yeah, he's okay.”

“As I probably wouldn't still be standing here if it wasn't for Will and everything he's done while you no doubt thought he was just dutifully playing nice and kissing Hunley's ass,” I state, moving towards the door, “he's actually more than okay, but... Coming from you it's still pretty strong praise.”

“Like my opinion matters here anyway,” Luther declares with an unbothered shrug as he walks back over to the sofa and sits down. “Now... As I know I'm not the one you want to be talking to, just go already.”

“I...” Not really needing telling twice, I nod and step out of the room. “Upstairs, yeah?”

“First door on the left.”

“I'll see you in the morning, then.”

“Mmm... Don't let this go to your head, Ethan, but it's good to have you back.”

“It's good to... be... back,” I reply, glancing over my shoulder at Luther and giving him a rueful smile. “Being out in the cold and on the run? I'm telling you, it's over rated.”

Over rated. Hard. And, speaking from experience, has absolutely nothing to recommend it whatsoever. It is what it is though and, because it's not an emotion I've ever allowed myself to have much time for, I don't regret any of it. To put it bluntly, I can't. I can't dwell on it, or run through scenario after scenario about how I might have done things differently, and nor can I fall prey to thoughts of... what might have been.

Like every mission before it, it's over and done with. History.

I did what I felt I had to do and I know, and, yes, this is even with the benefit of hindsight, that I'd do it all over again if I had to.

It's just, not that I have plans to confess this to anyone any time soon, that I don't particularly want to, that's all. Not on my own, at any rate. I'll give it my all, and I'll save the day if I can and, because it's what I do, I'll quash my own needs in the name of the greater good, but, instead of doing it on my own and out in the cold, I'll do it with my team.

That is...

I... hope... I'll be doing it with my team.

Not just... any... team.

My team.

The team that, in one form or another, I've been apart from for close to nine months now.

It was only ever meant to be a short term thing. A couple of months at most. All very logical and sensible and, at first, when there was still an end date in sight, even quite tolerable. I had Benji by my side and Will on the other end of the phone whenever I needed him, and it was... okay. Not great, and certainly not what I'd grown used to in terms of just being part of a perfectly in sync team, but, knowing that things could have been far worse given how close to death both Will and Jane had been, it was, again, tolerable. Not as bad, anyway, as I'd expected it to be. 

Still a little shell shocked and antsy over how our last mission had ended and feeling the lingering after affects of having seen my friends so badly injured, I hadn't wanted to leave D.C. without them and had just made my peace with lurking around HQ until they were both fit enough to return to the field. Will, however, had other ideas and after putting up with a fortnight of my – limited, at best – nursing skills he, with his usual calm, careful, and thoroughly thought out in every possible detail manner, insisted that Benji and I return to the field while he and Jane, once they were physically up for it, held the fort back at HQ. It was, after all, meant to be only for a month or two while bones healed and strength was regained. Not a permanent change, just a sensible one that, as Will put it, worked for everyone. Jane, who just happens to be an even worse patient than I am, couldn't cope with Benji's over-the-top determination to... cater to her every need... and was at serious risk of snapping and just telling him to back the hell away, while Will, I think it's fairly safe to say, had just about had enough of my ministrations as well. We, that is, Benji and I, had their best interests at heart, and, albeit clumsily, we'd certainly been trying our hardest to to make their convalescence as easy and as pleasant as possible, but...

Let's just say it wasn't exactly our forte and leave it at that.

So, yes. Will's plan of sending us on our merry way was nothing if not perfectly sound. He'd return to the analyst's section while Jane, with only the smallest bit of reluctance on her part, would help train rookies in interrogation techniques until they were both fit enough to join us back out in the thick of things again. Meanwhile, instead of annoying them with our lurking, worrying and, in my case at least, mounting boredom at having nothing to do, Benji and I would be doing our thing in the field on our own, and...

Two or three months. That's was all it was meant to be for. We were still a team, and there was nothing to stop us from talking or emailing whenever we had a chance and, even though we were usually on different continents, I never, not once, really felt seperated from Will. Sure, I couldn't see, the odd video call notwithstanding, or touch him – which, okay, was far harder to come to terms with than I'd expected it to be – but I still knew he was... there... and that I could hear his voice whenever I wanted to. I knew he was following his rehab to the letter and growing stronger by the day, and that the end really was always in sight.

Then...

Then came London, and Lane, and life as I'd been reasonably contentedly taking for granted, came crashing to a somewhat spectacular end.

Out in the cold.

No team. No IMF. No contact.

Just...

… Determination and the unshakeable belief that it was what I had to do. The greater good being far more important than my own – happiness – life, I had to devote my attention to bringing the Syndicate if not down, then at the very least to light. It...

… Was just how it had to be.

It mightn't have been what I wanted, but it was what had to be.

And, again, I don't regret it. Not just because the ultimate outcome was the one I'd been striving for, but because I know I wouldn't hesitate to do it all over again if I had to. My grandfather used to say that if a job's worth doing, it's worth doing well and, having grown up admiring his own work ethic of never letting anything – weather, health, lack of either money or equipment – get in his way, it's a philosophy I've always subscribed to. My career isn't just a pay cheque to me or a way to kill time, it's, with one, reasonably recent exception, close to being everything to me. I don't do it to feed my ego or, regardless of what some might think, because I'm addicted to either the adrenaline or the danger of being in the field. No. I do it because I believe wholeheartedly in both protecting the innocent and delivering justice, and because, at the end of the day, someone has to do it.

I'd just rather not do it on my own, that's all.

Not now that the team of people I've chosen to work with are more like family than they are just colleagues, or even mere friends. 

I want...

… My team back.

I want Jane and Benji, and to know that Luther's always going to be there if I need him, and I want... Will.

I want my lover.

My lover, who not so very long ago I'd accepted I'd be lucky to ever see again and who, to my continued amazement, not only risked his own career to come to my aid when I needed it the most, but who is now only a few metres away and waiting for me.

It's possibly odd, if not a very sad comment on my life in general, but knowing that Will hasn't just written me off as some sort of a bad joke and moved on would, even with all the other insanity that's gone on recently, have to be the greatest surprise to me of all. I mean, I always thought we had something special together, but six months is a long time – especially when there was never any guaranteed end date, or, for that matter, any assurance of a 'happy ending' either in sight – and I wouldn't have blamed him if he'd cut his losses and just walked away. Will, despite those that don't know him very well viewing him as either standoffish or focussed solely on his work, is far more of a 'people person' than most would ever give him credit for and he's happiest around those he can trust and just be himself with. Finding himself, even with Benji as backup, in the midst of the CIA and with Hunley breathing down his neck and watching his every move would have been hell for him. Surrounded by strangers who most likely didn't trust him or even want anything to do with him, he would have formed a self-protective shell around himself and, so as not to give the impression of doing anything to rock the boat, just kept to himself.

And, in the eyes of the CIA, who I fully suspect would have made sure he heard this at least once, if not twice a day, his miserable existence lay solely on my head. Not the Syndicate, but me, Ethan Hunt. It was my fault the IMF had been shut down and it was also my fault that, too selfish and egotistical to come in and face the music, I'd abandoned IMF – and Will – to pursue my own delusional goals.

Hunley having made it that far up the CIA ladder because he's nothing if not good at his job, Will could have easily fallen for the bullshit he was being fed. Again, I wouldn't have blamed him if he had. Unable to communicate with him in any reasonable way due to the knowledge that his every move would have been being watched, all I was able to get through to him in heavily coded 'spam' emails and unsolicited mail was my ever-changing location and the fact that I believed I was getting closer. That's all. I couldn't tell him my side of the story, or that I was sorry that it had come to this, and nor could I tell him that I loved and missed him and wanted, desperately, for things to have been different.

He knew next to nothing of the truth I was working towards and had to contend with Hunley and his trained monkeys trying to skew his opinion of me, yet...

When the kill order went out he didn't think twice of throwing caution to the winds and coming for me.

And now, it's not only over, but in a few short moments we're finally going to find ourselves alone together.

Mentally scarred and bone weary from everything I've been through, it's almost enough to strike me as being – a figment of my imagination – too good to be true. Like in Morocco when I got the shock – or second shock, depending on the way you look at it when you compare it to the whole 'being brought back from the dead' thing that had happened only minutes before – of my life when, quite literally out of nowhere, I saw him behind the wheel of the 4X4 through the drivers side window of the BMW. My initial thought, as the cogs whirred in my befuddled head and I struggled to comprehend that, yes, I really was seeing who it was I thought I was seeing, was one of complete disbelief. Even later, when we all met up in that derelict little bar to plan our next move, I could still hardly believe it. 

Will. He was there. For me. 

And, against the odds, he's still here. Not just as part of a team intent on achieving the bigger picture and having to do everything and more that's asked of him, but because it's where he wants to be.

Where...

… I don't just want, but... need... him to be.

Smiling to myself at the thought of what's in my very near future, I pass the kitchen on my way towards the stairs and hear, even before I glance through the door and see him, Benji enthusiastically bringing Jane up to speed on all our recent goings on. Having shared Luther's refusal to toe the party line and join the CIA after the IMF was shut down, Jane's been working for her brother's security firm and I hope nothing in what Benji's telling her is enough to convince her she's better off staying where she now is. Knowing her, I doubt it will be though and like to think she'll already be back in D.C. and waiting for us at the airport when we land as, regardless of whether it's jumping the gun or not, I just want us all back together again. I know things won't be the same between us for a while, and that, particularly with Benji, I'll have a few bridges to work hard at rebuilding, but I'm still confident that, in time, we'll settle back in to our old rhythm and everything will be fine.

It...

To be honest, it's what I'm counting on. 

Will. The team. I'm not asking for the world, just for things to go back to how they had been. That's all.

Not wanting to risk Benji catching sight of me for reasons that range from being focussed on Will to being too tired to deal with him to... all the way down to the sense of guilt I'm feeling about what happened to him, I hurry past the doorway and start up the stairs. Benji, if he hasn't already, will forgive me. I know that. Just as I know, deep down, I'll always blame myself for being responsible for what he went through at the hands of Lane. Benji's a field agent. A good one, at that. Far better, in fact, than I suspect he'll ever be acknowledged for, and one of the few I'd willingly trust with my life. He's also one of my closest friends and I love him like a brother. What he's not though, and this is where the guilt comes in to it, is Will.

Just like Will's were when he sent Benji and I back to work while he and Jane licked their wounds in D.C., my reasons for calling Benji to Vienna were all very sound and clinically logical. I knew he'd be able to successfully fulfil the role I needed him to and that his loyalty to IMF would mean that he'd come without hesitation. It also, or so I very busily told myself, made complete sense to use Benji because Will was too valuable a resource in D.C.. While our communication was limited, I still knew that I could rely on him to get word to me if the CIA were ever getting too close to my whereabouts and, because of this, I couldn't afford for him to either leave his post or do anything to draw even more suspicion on himself. So...

Benji.

For reasons I'd be able to easily justify if ever asked, it just had to be Benji.

The thing is though, while it's not something I even like admitting to myself and have every intention of taking to my grave, my real reason for choosing Benji over Will was...

… One of complete and utter weakness.

My weakness, in fact.

Unable to cope with the thought of being able to... see... Will while, at the same time, knowing that I couldn't go to him, I took the coward's way out and focussed my attention on Benji. It had nothing to do with risk management at all, and everything to do with my – slowly going stir crazy on my own – delicate mental state. I wanted, would have given anything, even, to have Will with me, and I just wasn't prepared to tempt fate by doing anything – like having him only metres away – that could weaken my resolve.

Benji, however...

Benji was... safe. He'd fly in, do what I wanted him to, and then he'd fly out. Seeing him wouldn't... hurt... or make me want to wave the white flag of defeat by going to him, and that would have just been that.

Only...

… It didn't quite work like that and Benji very easily could have paid for my weakness with his life.

He didn't, and his assistance in the long run proved to be invaluable, and I know there's not a damn thing to say that what ended up happening couldn't have happened to anyone – Will, Luther, Jane – that I'd called in, but...

… I still hold myself responsible and that, really, is all there is to it. 

Benji went above and beyond for me, and I know that what Lane put him through will give him nightmares for years to come, and... 

It's all on my head.

I don't, because it's just not an emotion I can ever allow myself to have, regret having called Benji in, but what I do carry with me over it is a sense of guilt.

Making a mental note to – man up – try to talk to Benji about it before I decide the most logical way to make it up to him is to come over as all over-protective and dominating, I bite back a sigh and start up the stairs. My mood being all over the place at the moment, my earlier sense of pleasure at soon being reunited with Will starts to desert me the closer I get to the landing and, having finished with worrying about Benji for the time being, I move on to worrying about Will and just what it is I'll be able to either say or do to get it across to him that he means the world to me and I never want to be apart from him for so long ever again. All our time, ever since he and Luther unexpectedly joined Benji and I in Morocco, having been devoted solely to the task of bringing down Lane and the Syndicate, we haven't even had so much as a moment alone to sneak in a quick kiss or share a few private words and now that I'm so close to finally having him all to myself, I'm...

… Worried that, in my desperation to get my life back together again, I've perhaps been reading things incorrectly.

What if Will really has moved on and he only came to Morocco out of loyalty not to me but to the IMF?

What if he's pissed with me for everything that's gone down and, being nothing if not organised and thorough, he wants to share the error of my ways with me himself?

What if he feels I've let him down?

What if...

… He tells me that, after careful consideration, it's all over between us and he'd be grateful if I had nothing to do with him from this point forward?

Coming to a stop in front of his door, I run my fingers through my hair and dither over what to do next. Do I knock on the door and possibly wake him up in the process, or do I tell myself that seeing him can wait until morning and retreat to another room where I can just spend the rest of the night worrying myself sick in private? Alternatively, do I just... leave? Accept that I'm more trouble than I'm worth to everyone else in the house and, having survived it once, simply continue on my own?

I...

I just don't know.

I know what I want, but I just don't know if it's the... right... thing to do.

Feeling more and more agitated and indecisive by the second, I'm closing in on reaching the snap decision of just taking myself off to hide in the bathroom for a while when the bedroom door is slowly pulled open and Will materialises in front of me. Dressed for bed in navy blue pyjama pants and a well worn, almost threadbare in a few places grey T-shirt that hugs his torso in all the right places, he looks half asleep and, with his hair both clean and free of product, even just that little bit ruffled, and...

… It, the sight of Will, smiling cautiously and looking at me with such expectation in his blue eyes, is almost too much for me to bear.

He's here for me. He still wants me. After all this time and all the shit I've basically been responsible for heaping on him, he's still here, and, for that reason alone I suddenly feel like the luckiest man on earth.

I don't know who makes the first move. It might have been me. I might have – seen the light – found a way through my shock to step over the threshold and into Will's waiting arms. Or it might just as easily, if not even more likely, have been Will. Tired of watching me just stand there, most likely with a vacant expression on my face and with my mouth hanging slightly open, he might have taken matters into his own hands and pulled me into the room. Either way, within seconds of him having opened the bedroom door we're in each other's arms and the sense of relief I'm getting from both the feel and the warmth of his body pressed so tightly against mine is nothing short of astonishing. It really is. It's not the relief of seeing a plan work or even that of knowing that you've done it, that, in this particular case, Lane is now safely in the hands of the appropriate authorities. No. It's something else entirely. It's reassurance, trust, comfort, and an overwhelming sense of love all rolled up in the tight embrace of a man I know, more so than ever before, I'm just lost without. It's the relief of knowing that it's finally over and that, somehow, against the odds, we've survived. Together.

It's also fucking incredible.

“Will, I...”

“Shhh...” Shifting slightly, Will plants a soft kiss on my cheek and hugs me to him just that little bit harder. “I've got you,” he murmurs as, his breath catching in his throat, he locks his eyes on mine. “It's all over, Ethan, I... I've got you, and this time I'm not letting go.”

~ end ~


End file.
